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Wednesday, June 28, 2006

If God's in His Heaven, then Audrey's still singing

This is my grandmother Audrey, mother of my father, when she was ten years old, and this is the picture that moved me to tears when it was given to me recently. If ever I saw innocence in my life, I see it here in her face.

Audrey was born in 1900. Her childhood, from all I've learned, wasn't a particularly happy one. She was the only child of her father, whom her mother divorced when she was very young. Subsequently, her mother remarried and had four more daughters. As the oldest girl, Audrey no doubt had a lot of responsibility for the care of her younger sisters, and there must have been times when she felt like Cinderella among her half-sisters (although I doubt they were wicked ones).

Audrey grew up and married a kind, gentle, hardworking man, and together they had nine children. As you can imagine, that wasn't an easy life either, but she did what it took to get the job done and then raised three grandchildren besides.

I remember my grandmother Audrey clearly from family get-togethers, but I never felt I knew her well. I know she must have been a patient person, because she let me play her upright piano for long stretches of time. She didn't stop me as I tried over and over again to pick out simple tunes, even though my wrong notes and frequent start-overs must have driven her insane.

I was 16 the last time I saw her. The fact that I'm possibly the worst communicator in the world may be the reason why the letters we exchanged, infrequent even in the beginning, eventually stopped altogether. I'm sure she wrote to a lot of people who took the time to write back to her, and I didn't hold up my end of the bargain.

Recently, through aunts and uncles and cousins, I've learned a lot more about my grandmother's life. I've learned that my own love of writing may have been inherited from her and that all the time she was managing her large household, she dreamed of becoming a published writer. My aunts have sent me copies of some of her stories. All I could think of as I read them was how much she'd have enjoyed living in the Internet age, where a fledgling writer has so much access to an audience. I think she would have been thrilled at the endless possibilities.

Even though my grandmother's written words haven't been published, the Internet has given her a taste of immortality in another way. I didn't know it, but when she was 70 years old, she participated with many others in a very special music project. I discovered this years and years later, more than a decade after she passed away, when I googled her name one day. I'd done it before without interesting results, but that day I struck gold. I clicked on the link, paused for a few moments to grasp what it was I'd stumbled across, then scrolled down until I found her: Barclay, Audrey. I clicked again on a title below her name and, for the first time since 1959, heard her familiar voice. That day, for the first time I could remember, I heard my grandmother sing.

6 comments:

I think the Internet, and in particular the Web, is the greatest communication technology ever created...better than radio, television or the phone. I also google people I've known and/or loved all the time, and some of the things I've found are just remarkable....but not as remarkable as hearing your grandmother's voice for the first time in 47 years. Thanks for telling us about your discovery. It gave me chills.

Somebody Lied, that is probably the sweetest thing I've ever heard. I could see her sitting down in a chair singing to grandchildren. I could almost picture her. What a sweet, sweet testament to her memory.

About Me

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On the Internet to Find the Others

"Admit it. You aren't like them. You're not even close. You may occasionally dress yourself up as one of them, watch the same mindless television shows as they do, maybe even eat the same fast food sometimes. But it seems that the more you try to fit in, the more you feel like an outsider, watching the 'normal people' as they go about their automatic existences. For every time you say club passwords like 'Have a nice day' and 'Weather's awful today, eh?', you yearn inside to say forbidden things like 'Tell me something that makes you cry' or 'What do you think deja vu is for?' Face it, you even want to talk to that girl in the elevator. But what if that girl in the elevator (and the balding man who walks past your cubicle at work) are thinking the same thing? Who knows what you might learn from taking a chance on conversation with a stranger? Everyone carries a piece of the puzzle. Nobody comes into your life by mere coincidence. Trust your instincts. Do the unexpected. Find the others..."

The Introvert

She cared for those trinkets as if they were cherished heirlooms, rarely displaying them in public. She stored them in protective velvet sacks, drawing them out only when she was alone or in the company of those she trusted to understand why the simple objects mattered. And as careful as she was to protect the trinkets, so she was cautious about sharing her words, and for the same reasons.